The Buzz: Save Mart opens in May. Four questions answered about the new store. – Redding Record Searchlight

Opening next May at Churn Creek MarketPlace in south Redding, Save Mart plans to hold job hiring fairs in late January or early February.

The 50,000-square-foot grocery store will anchor the shopping center, which already includes Redding’s second In-N-Out Burger, second Panda Express and fifth AM/PM ARCO. A second Ross Dress For Less and third Les Schwab also will be there, but opening dates for them have not been announced.

“We’re really excited to get in there and open up and be a part of the community,” The Save Mart Companies spokeswoman Stacia Levenfeld told me.

And now for what you want to know about the store:

How many people will Save Mart hire?

Levenfeld said more than 100 people will work in the store.

Except for management, all will be union jobs. Levenfeld said union employees are represented by the United Food & Commercial Workers Local 8.

UFCW Local 8 also represents workers at Safeway, Vons and FoodMaxx, and in October, the union ratified a new labor contract, per Supermarket News.

At this time, Save Mart has not announced where the job fairs in Redding will be held or how many the company will host. Levenfeld expects to have more information in January.

“Everybody should be hired by March so we can start the training,” she said.

Stay tuned.

How does Save Mart compare to other stores in the area?

Save Mart is owned by the same company as FoodMaxx, but unlike its sister store, you won’t have to bag your own groceries.

Levenfeld declined to draw comparisons with other stores in our area, like Holiday, Raley’s and Safeway, but she did say the new Save Mart will be a full-service supermarket, with a deli, meat cutters on site and custom cake-making services, among the offerings.

“We want to make sure that prices are accessible to everyone in the community,” Levenfeld said.

What’s more, Save Mart does its best to tailor its stores to the communities they serve.

“Residents will see local products on our shelves,” Levenfeld said.

Wait, Save Mart and FoodMaxx in the same city — is that common?

Even though both stores are owned by The Save Mart Companies, it’s not unusual to see them operate in the same city.

That’s the case in Chico, where both Save Mart and FoodMaxx have served Butte County residents for many years.

“They complement each other,” Levenfeld said of the two brands.

The Save Mart Companies is based in Modesto and operates 209 stores under the FoodMaxx, Lucky and Save Mart names in California and northern Nevada.

What do Save Mart and In-N-Out have in common?

When Save Mart opens in Redding, it will be the chain’s northern-most store in California.

Redding’s In-N-Out Burger on Dana Drive also is the chain’s northern-most in California, beating out the Churn Creek MarketPlace location by about 5 miles.

This will be only the second new Save Mart store to be built over the past 18 years. The other newly constructed store is in Modesto, which opened in October.

Shasta’s Capitol display gets financial boost

Buoyed by recent contributions from Turtle Bay Exploration Park, Sierra Pacific Industries Foundation, Forward Redding and Redding Electric Utility, work to update Shasta County’s Capitol display in Sacramento will soon start.

All told, organizers have raised more than $35,000 toward the $40,000 goal.

Dignity Health, Shasta Cascade Wonderland Association, Lake Shasta Caverns and the Redding Rancheria also have made significant contributions, said Randi Slaughter, who’s spearheading efforts to update the display.

“We are grateful for the amount of support and generosity we have received,” Slaughter said.

Slaughter expects the new display to debut in the hallways of the Capitol building next spring. It will take about eight weeks to build, and Nix & Gerber, with the help of a local graphic designer, will create the new exhibit. Nix & Gerber has been featured in Time magazine. “We Make Large Things Small” is its tagline.

Efforts to update Shasta County’s display started two years ago, but not until Slaughter, working with her husband, Rocky Slaughter, did it get traction. They made five trips to Sacramento earlier this year, spending about two hours each time in the halls of the Capitol observing how visitors interacted with the 58 county displays.

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Though Shasta’s doesn’t feature the technical glitz of other counties, Randi Slaughter told Shasta County supervisors in June that people she interviewed at the Capitol liked it.

“Shasta County is one of the top ones, bright and beautiful. Don’t change a thing about it,” was one of the comments she heard.

With feedback like that, Slaughter has decided to update Shasta’s diorama, pinpointing present locales like the Sundial Bridge and others that pay tribute to our past.

“I think the key is we found with doing boots-on-the-ground research … you know how to move forward instead of just guessing what would work,” Slaughter said of why she thinks they’ve had success raising money.

Slaughter’s group has partnered with the Shasta Regional Community Foundation, where there is a Shasta County Capitol Display Fund. There you also can view project plans via an entertaining YouTube video Slaughter put together.

Greater downtown home for music, theater

It appears Bethel Church has found a home in greater downtown Redding for its music and theatrical arms.

Per Jon Lewis’ DATE story, Bethel Conservatory of the Arts is headquartered at 935 Locust St., one of three buildings Bethel leases from Royal Arts Holdings LLC. The other buildings are its theater at 1040 Locust St. — where it’s staging “Nora” this weekend, the conservatory’s public debut — and the former R&R Meats store at 2105 East St. It’s an area a few blocks south of downtown.

Fabiano Altamura, the conservatory’s artistic director, has not announced plans for the former R&R Meats building.

Lewis also reported that Bethel Conservatory of the Arts is offering a bachelor’s degree in acting, thanks to accreditation by Visible Music College of Memphis, Tennessee.

Bethel Music soon will relocate to downtown.

The label is moving its headquarters from Caterpillar Road in north Redding to the corner of Yuba and Pine Streets inside the former Salvation Army thrift shop space. The move will bring an estimated 70 jobs downtown.

Bethel Music anticipates opening downtown in early 2020.

David Benda covers business, development and anything else that comes up for the USA TODAY Network in Redding. He also writes the weekly “Buzz on the Street” column. He’s part of a team of dedicated reporters that investigate wrongdoing, cover breaking news and tell other stories about your community. Reach him on Twitter @DavidBenda_RS or by phone at 1-530-225-8219. To support and sustain this work, please subscribe today.

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